This longitudinal study investigates the development and interrelation of adolescent learners’ L2 English vocabulary knowledge and extramural English (EE) input. The study examines the longitudinal development of L2 English receptive vocabulary knowledge, EE input and the dynamics between L2 proficiency and EE input. Data were collected at four time points by administering vocabulary tests and questionnaires on EE activities. Generalized additive mixed models and growth curve models indicated significant vocabulary growth, particularly in the early years of secondary school, which slowed down toward the end of the study. EE activities such as gaming, social media and reading positively predicted vocabulary development, while watching television with L1 subtitles had a negative effect. Temporal network analysis revealed reciprocal relationships, suggesting that L2 proficiency influences EE input and vice versa. The findings underscore the importance of EE in L2 vocabulary development and highlight the dynamic interplay between language learning and extramural activities.

Variation is present in every language at every structural level. Though extremely complex, linguistic variation is not fully unpredictable. Previous research suggests that cognitive biases in learning favour conditioned variation: learners often make languages more predictable by eliminating variation or by conditioning it on context, pointing to the presence of biases against random variation. Learning biases favour lexical conditioning over more general category-based conditioning, though both occur in natural languages. Interaction may also contribute to shaping conditioned variation by providing a mechanism for interlocutors to develop a shared system through the coordination of individual preferences. In the present study, we investigated the role of dyadic interaction in the emergence of conditioned variation. We trained participants on an artificial language with unpredictable variation in plural marking and objects representing one or two semantic categories and had them play a communication game using the newly learned language. We hypothesised that interaction would introduce category-based conditioning, this being the simplest conditioned system in the language. Contrary to our expectations, we found no evidence of spontaneous category-based conditioning: participants either removed variation or conditioned marker use on lexical items. Further experiments are needed to explain the emergence of this common linguistic pattern.

The question we tackle in this paper is why some indefinite nominal expressions are licit in Romance despite the absence of number marking on the determiner and on the noun, an unexpected option in Romance languages, which are number marking languages (Gil 1987). We focus on the invariable DE found in some Francoprovençal varieties and compare it with partitive articles (PAs) in French/Francoprovençal. We propose that invariable DE and the DE component of PAs explicitly express semantic number, more precisely cumulative reference, and that DE can hence satisfy the requirement of D° to encode number/quantification information (following Delfitto & Schroten 1991). DE combines with an overt or covert ILLE component in a separate functional head (Num°/#°; morphosyntactic number), resulting in PAs and bimorphemic-DE, respectively. As a result, DE is semantically and morphologically equivalent to PAs, except for a non-overt component with DE. Our analysis further shows that the mass/count distinction is not morphologically encoded in Romance but rather a byproduct of the two oppositions plural/singular (morphosyntactic number) and cumulative/atomic reference (semantic number).

Most people are multilingual, and most multilinguals code-switch, yet the characteristics of code-switched language are not fully understood. We developed a chatbot capable of completing a Map Task with human participants using code-switched Spanish and English. In two experiments, we prompted the bot to code-switch according to different strategies, examining (1) the feasibility of such experiments for investigating bilingual language use and (2) whether participants would be sensitive to variations in discourse and grammatical patterns. Participants generally enjoyed code-switching with our bot as long as it produced predictable code-switching behavior; when code-switching was random or ungrammatical (as when producing unattested incongruent mixed-language noun phrases, such as ‘la fork’), participants enjoyed the task less and were less successful at completing it. These results underscore the potential downsides of deploying insufficiently developed multilingual language technology, while also illustrating the promise of such technology for conducting research on bilingual language use.

Texts, whether literary or historical, exhibit structural and stylistic patterns shaped by their purpose, authorship and cultural context. Formulaic texts, which are characterized by repetition and constrained expression, tend to differ in their information content (as defined by Shannon) compared to more dynamic compositions. Identifying such patterns in historical documents, particularly multi-author texts like the Hebrew Bible, provides insights into their origins, purpose and transmission. This study aims to identify formulaic clusters: sections exhibiting systematic repetition and structural constraints, by analyzing recurring phrases, syntactic structures and stylistic markers. However, distinguishing formulaic from non-formulaic elements in an unsupervised manner presents a computational challenge, especially in high-dimensional and sample-poor data sets where patterns must be inferred without predefined labels.

To address this, we develop an information-theoretic algorithm leveraging weighted self-information distributions to detect structured patterns in text. Our approach directly models variations in sample-wise self-information to identify formulaicity. By extending classical discrete self-information measures with a continuous formulation based on differential self-information in multivariate Gaussian distributions, our method remains applicable across different types of textual representations, including neural embeddings under Gaussian priors.

Applied to hypothesized authorial divisions in the Hebrew Bible, our approach successfully isolates stylistic layers, providing a quantitative framework for textual stratification. This method enhances our ability to analyze compositional patterns, offering deeper insights into the literary and cultural evolution of texts shaped by complex authorship and editorial processes.

Idioms are undoubtedly important for second language (L2) learners, who encounter them in instructed learning, textbooks/resources and in out-of-class language use. While research on first language (L1) and L2 idiom comprehension shows how well L1/L2 speakers understand various idioms and the role of different predictors, important questions remain about how knowledge varies with more difficult task types and stimuli, how well L1 ‘norms’ serve L2 learners, how subjective and objective predictors of idiom knowledge interact and how L2 learner inferencing works in learning idioms. To address these issues, university-age L1 and L2 English (L1 German) participants provided meaning descriptions and familiarity ratings for 100 challenging idioms from learner resources, and each idiom was assigned an OpenAI-generated transparency rating, corpus-based frequency and to one of six cross-language overlap (CLO) types. Descriptive statistics showed lower and more varied idiom meaning knowledge than might be expected, especially for the L1ers, who were some way off ceiling level. Mixed-effects regression revealed familiarity and transparency as positive L1 and L2 knowledge predictors, but groups differed in sensitivity to idiom frequency, which only mattered for the L1ers and CLO, which (as expected) only mattered for the L2ers, who mistook false friends as genuine allies.

This study examines Swahili-language Islamic marital booklets (vijitabu) written between 1932 and 2020, focusing on their gendered chronotopes and nostalgic elements. These booklets, written by and for Muslim men, offer advice on marriage, sexuality, and related topics, reflecting societal changes and the influence of reformist Islam in East Africa. The analysis identifies four prominent chronotopic formulations: the contemporary East African context, the time and place of the Prophet Muhammad, the pre-Islamic world (jahiliya), and the modern West. A potential fifth chronotope, the afterlife (akhera), is contingent on adherence to the first four. The booklets valorize the Prophet Muhammad’s era while criticizing other temporal and spatial contexts, advocating for a return to early Islamic gender norms and marital practices to achieve happiness in the afterlife. This study highlights the booklets’ role in shaping gender norms and religiopolitical ideologies, revealing the interplay between nostalgia, religious authority, and sociopolitical context in East African Muslim communities.

Although German, as a grammatical gender language, requires noun–pronoun agreement in anaphora, exceptions to the rule occur, e.g., in possessive constructions when the gender-incongruent possessive pronoun sein (masculine/neuter, his/its) refers to feminine antecedents instead of congruent ihr (feminine, her). While this violation is merely grammatical for inanimate referents, it can provoke semantic mismatches for human possessors (especially gender-specific female nouns like die Hexei – seini (the witch – his/its), but less so with gender-indifferent human nouns, such as die Kontaktperson (the contact person). A self-paced reading (SPR) experiment tested the acceptability and processing of sentences in which incongruent sein referred to feminine possessors, which differed in animacy status (inanimate versus human). Introducing this agreement violation reduced acceptability and elevated reading and reaction times (RTs), but effects varied by antecedent animacy. These results suggest an animacy restriction in possessive reference and substantiate the impact of meaning-based gender cues on pronominalization.